Rape Kits Now Being Tested Decades Late

According to some estimates, between 180,000 and 400,000 rape kits remain untested nationwide, despite DNA technology that can swiftly link rapists to crimes. Between 9,000 and 11,300 rape kits stored by Detroit police were collected two years ago by Michigan State Police, and testing has finally begun on some of these kits. They are being documented as part of a National Institute for Justice project. “Women go to the hospital and their bodies are a crime scene and treated as such,” said a woman who was raped in Texas in 1984 but whose rape kit was not tested for 24 years. “For these kits then to just to sit in a laboratory or in police vaults or wherever they sit, denies victims of sexual assault any opportunity for justice. I just wonder how many more there are?” The Times News carried this story